Crisis at the Coastline: Disruption at the Water's Edge
Russian marine diesel exports saw a significant decrease in July 2025, according to recent reports. The drop was primarily due to increased domestic demand, planned refinery maintenance, and damages to refineries caused by Ukrainian drone strikes.
The overall seaborne refined petroleum exports from Russia declined by 6.6% in July compared to June, with a notable decrease in diesel and gasoil exports. This decrease in production led to lower export volumes.
The increased domestic consumption diverted refined products away from export markets, contributing to the decline. Additionally, maintenance works at multiple refineries across various regions restricted production capacity. Notably, the Saratov refinery, with a capacity of 140,000 barrels per day, was forced offline following Ukrainian drone attacks.
Despite an increase in exports from the far Eastern ports, as most refinery maintenance was completed there, it was not enough to offset declines elsewhere.
The decrease in exports was particularly evident in supplies to Brazil, which halved, and in STS transshipment. On the other hand, Russia's railway exports of diesel increased by 24% compared to June, to 398 thousand tons.
Turkey, the largest importer of Russian diesel fuel since 2022, saw a 14.07% decrease in imports in July. However, the Center for Price Indices (CPI) calculated that the indicator for July 2025 exceeded the level of July 2024 by 2.71%.
Analyst David Martirosyan at CPI links the decrease in exports to Brazil with increased purchases from other suppliers such as India and the US. In the first six days of August, the average daily total export of diesel from Russia decreased by 25-27% compared to July, due to unplanned refinery shutdowns following drone attacks.
Kazakhstan reduced imports by 53% to 31,000 tons due to the resumption of operations at the 6 million-ton-per-year capacity Pavlodar Petrochemical Plant (PNPZ). Supply to Mongolia surged by 50% in a month to 188,000 tons.
Andrei Dyachenko believes that the damage already done to the refineries is unlikely to be compensated by reserves or rescheduling repairs, which could result in a 15-20% decrease in diesel supplies from Russia in August. Analysts at S&P Global Commodities at Sea noted that supplies of oil products from Russia to Brazil are decreasing due to US threats to impose higher duties on buyers of Russian products.
Brazil purchases Russian oil products less regularly due to its own refining capacity shortages. Sergey Tsivilev, Minister of Energy, stated that sometimes there are moments when the schedule for conducting repairs is shifted from the plan. Igor Yushkov notes that Russia produces diesel approximately twice as much as it consumes, so if refining decreases, some exports could be redirected to the domestic market.
Marine exports of diesel to Africa decreased by 11.93% in July. The volume of Russian diesel fuel, which Kazakhstan actively purchased during the PNPZ repair, was redirected to Uzbekistan in July: exports to the country doubled to 43,000 tons. Analysts predict a 15-20% drop in export volumes by the end of August due to unscheduled outages at refineries.
In conclusion, the convergence of higher local fuel demand, scheduled refinery maintenance, and infrastructure disruptions from conflict-related attacks largely account for the drop in Russian marine diesel exports in July 2025.
Despite the increase in exports from the far Eastern ports, the overall seaborne refined petroleum exports from Russia observed a decline due to the drop in diesel and gasoil exports, contributing to lower export volumes.
The overall decrease in exports was evident in supplies to Brazil, Turkey (the largest importer of Russian diesel fuel since 2022), and Africa, with a significant drop observed in all three regions.
